February 22, 2006

Shiite militia members flooded the streets of Baghdad, firing rocket-propelled grenades and machine guns at Sunni mosques as Iraqi Army soldiers — called out to stop the violence — stood helpless nearby. By the day's end, mobs had struck 27 Sunni mosques in the capital, killing three imams and kidnapping a fourth, Interior Ministry officials said.

In the southern Shiite city of Basra, Shiite militia members destroyed at least two Sunni mosques, killing an imam, and launched an attack on the headquarters of Iraq's best-known Sunni Arab political party. In Samarra, thousands of people crowded the courtyard of the Golden Mosque, some weeping and kissing the stones, others angrily chanting "Our blood and souls we sacrifice for you imams!"

The violence of one religious sect against another: is there a lower manifestation of the human mind?

The violence of one religious sect against another: is there a lower manifestation of the human mind?

Lying about weapons of mass destruction to bring about war for partisan political gain

Lying about the safety of the conditions in lower manhattan after 9/11

Fomenting class warfare for partisan political gains

Fomenting anger in the religious right for partisan political gains

An enlightened American President lying about torture, encouraging torture by our troops.

An enlightened American President and his party exploiting Terri Schiavo for partisan political gain

Outing a covert CIA operative for revenge, thereby endangering that agent and her network as well as other agents and their networks as well as the country for partisan political gain

Ignoring and silencing scientists in the fields of evolution, medicine, stem cell research, global warming, environmentalism for money and partisan political gain

Endangering the country's stance on civil liberties for power and partisan political gain.

Being a divider and not a uniter for partisan political gain

Shirking duty to the country by not going after Bin Laden to go after Hussein and oil for power, money, and partisan political gain.

Ignoring warnings about war in Iraq and doing it on the cheap thereby threatening the lives of innocent Americans and innocent Iraqis for partisan political gain.

And on and on and on.

What is a lower manifestation of the human mind than religious wars? The cynical corruption of a populace by so called enlightened, democratic leaders in the name of money, power, and partisan political gain.

The leader of Iraq's main Shiite political alliance said he thought Zalmay Khalilzad, the American ambassador to Iraq, was partly to blame for the bombing of the shrine.

The Shiite leader, Abdul Aziz al Hakim, said he thought Mr. Khalilzad's public comments on Monday, in which he drew attention to apparent death squads operating within Iraq's Shiite-led Interior Ministry, were a provocation to the bombing.

Oh the Muslims are a friendly folk,they treat all men as brothersthey only fight with infidels...and also with each other.

I originally heard that song sung about the fighting in N Ireland. (replace Muslims with Irish and infidels with Englishmen.)

Also, from a book I'm reading about the battle of Casino in WWII,

"The abby of Monte Casino was founded by St Benedict in 529. ... When he arrived a temple to Apollo occupied part of the summit. Benedict's first action was to demolish the temple and consecrate his altar on the spot where the pagan shrine had been.

Those are a lot worse than lying about lying about weapons of mass destruction.

I have my reasons for saying it's the lowest, even though there are obviously worse things a person can do. My reason is that in religion, people are looking for the highest things, then through that path, they find motivation to destroy, and they choose to destroy what is, for someone else, their highest thing, their holy site. Only human reasoning could come up with this. A lower animal could torture and shred a suffering victim, but it takes a higher mind, perverted, to think of this.

The violence of one religious sect against another: is there a lower manifestation of the human mind?

I don't know, I've always been partial to parsing the differences between atheists shoveling entire populations into ovens, or just making them dig gold in Siberia with their bare hands until they're frozen to death.

It is an especially interesting query when one takes a macro view and sees religious sectarian violence for what it is: the greatest single cause of war and death in history.

If one subscribes to the belief that there is a world which we cannot see that interacts with ours, it is almost as if there is an epic battle between a diametrically opposed "good" and "evil" using the material world as its current battleground...and religious wars are the place where this conflict bubbles up most often. And with horrifying results.

one takes a macro view and sees religious sectarian violence for what it is: the greatest single cause of war and death in history.

I don't think so.

Everybody just gets fed up with trying to add up the zeroes and stops trying to calculate after they get to the 125,000,000 mark of people that got murdered or starved to death by their own atheist governments in the twentieth century alone.

That's leaving aside all the people that got killed in wars these atheist governments started.

Human beings believing they are divine kill a lot more persons than those that believe in the divinity of things not of this world.

Ignorance is the lowest manifestation of the human mind. Specifically, when the mind chooses to stay comfortable with what it knows. This is also one of the highest degrees of waste. Sectarian religious violence is but one example.

I have to agree with SC. People have done some extraordinarily reprehensible things in the name of religious ideologies, but I think it is demonstrably false to say that they've been more horrible than things done in the name of atheistic ones.

this marks the beginning of the end for the american occupation of iraq. our soldiers will be standing between two bloodthirsty groups as the targets of both sides---i foresee a somalia (or lebanon)-like withdrawal. a great pity for all concerned.

Sistani has been the only thingstanding between Al Sadr andthe Sunni population. It wouldnot surpirse me if Sadr werebehind the bombing. Sistani isone of those rare heroic figureswho wants the best for his people,yet all this may be beyond hiscontrol.

Didn't the experts who counseledBushOne warn of the likely chaosif a foreign nation occupied Iraq?

Why did this team think they couldconquer the odds? God knows.

All I know is the question thefamilies of the dead and theblind, brain-damaged, burnt andparlayzed US military may have toask; "Was the sacrifice worth thecost?"